Tagged: Greek inspired

It is an inevitable truth that everything that has a beginning has an end. Some enjoy heights of success, only to falter and fade away, then fall into oblivion to disappear with nary a blip. Others are lamented in their eventual passing. Then there are those whose demise brings on waves of despair, shouts of protest, flowing tributes in homage. “How can it be true?” you hear people shout! “Where are we to turn?” they ponder in sadness. These are the lucky few. Their demise sends shockwaves among their supporters. They live amongst their fans forever.

This is what happened with the closure of Gourmet magazine. Witnessing the shock and despair of its legions of fans at Conde Nast’s decision to shut down this matriarch of the published food world, I have to admit I didn’t quite get it right away. I revere books; I’ve never been much of a magazine lover, the only ones I ever subscribed to were the Architectural Review, Readers’ Digest and Archie comics (yes, the 12 year old in me never quite grew up). The hue and cry baffled me. Surely this was just a magazine meeting an untimely demise at the hands of business people? Given the tough economy so many things have gone a similar way. Cookbooks are still around, so how bad could it be?

Life’s been so busy since some time before my birthday that there’s barely been any time to cook, let alone write about it. It’s like being caught between a multitude of rocks and hard places and having to move around with them slowly squeezing my breath out of me. Only today do I feel like I could come up for air. And I’m taking it in, giant large gulps of it.

I wasn’t certain I’d talk about recipes involving ready store-bought ingredients as relative stars of the meal. Not because I’m a ‘you-gotta-do-everything-from-scratch’ snob, but because to tell anyone about it seems a bit like claiming credit for something you didn’t really do. And that can’t be any good, can it? But then sometimes, a combination of stuff bought at the store, a tired brain and a soul desperate for nourishment that doesn’t taste like cardboard can create a good thing.

This combination turned out to be too easy, simple and relatively healthy to keep to myself. And there isn’t anything too difficult about obtaining its ingredients. I had bought some lavash with some vague memories of a recipe I’d read some time earlier. And then, original recipe forgotten, I scrambled to come up with a way to use it before it got past its prime. I’d also run into a sublime Tomato and Basil Hummus in the ready-eats aisle of Trader Joe’s, happily nestled next to the cheese section in which was a little tin of burrata (a fresh Italian cheese made from mozzarella and cream) both of which made it into my fridge and had been barely used.